Precious breath drawn this morning. Taking in the soft cooing sounds from a mourning dove. I am with you in spirit to greet the day. God's blessings and we are here again to celebrate anew. A whole day before us. What gifts will it bring? How will we honour and cherish each rising second? How will we pass on and share the rich bounty we are presented with? Questions fade and nothing remains but loving silence. Our loving gift to each other is to breathe it in with great appreciation and then lovingly extend this sweet energy outwards.

Blessed be this day.

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Love’s Inner Chamber by Nicola G. Karesh

I enter the inner chamber and close the door. Immediately, there is the delightful impression that love’s happy cells rush to surround and greet me! Brings a smile to my face and warmth to my heart. God’s energy bubbles are doing the happy dance ‘cos I’m here!

There may or may not be actual happy bubbles sent out on a mission from God to welcome me! All I can speak to, is the feeling that I have as I rest in silence.
There is an energetic acknowledgment of sorts. Awareness greeting itself. Comfortable warmth, being somewhere that feels like home. Everything is alright in this space. All concerns are left at the door, for that is not why I am here.

Why am I here? Why have I come this very day, to sit in silence?

Words escape me, as I search to capture the essence of what fills my heart. Still, I seek the elusive, for I feel called always to share my truth.

I am here to give thanks. I am here as an expression of my love and devotion. I am here in answer to an inner call to come home. I belong here.

Every moment when I have turned my back on God, I deny myself. Every time I come from a small sense of “i,” I am denying the larger dimension of who and what I am.

This divine space calls me. Sometimes I get busy with other matters and don’t hear the eternal bell that rings for you and for me. It is always ringing. In precious moments of grace, I hear and I answer love’s call.

One day, we will sing a song of love together. One day, the feeling of love will touch everything. It will be all that we know. It will be all that we are.

That day is here and that moment is now. The choice is ours to rest in this space.

 

Nicola G. Karesh, Copyright © 2009 – All rights reserved.

Visit my blog, "A Call To Grace" on wordpress

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Tender The Moment

A memory encapsulated in time.
A portrait framed with desire.
A love sealed with a kiss.
Soft, tender the moment.

Delicate petals unfold their ivory innocence.
Caressed by the golden rays of the sun.
Dew drops glisten shyly.
Held by arching blades of grass.

Fresh scent of pine needles bursting.
Fill the morning air.
Pure, sweet the feeling.
Rising up everywhere.

My soul is blessed with goodness.
God’s grace fills my heart.
Soft, tender the moment
Blossoming wildly in the dark.

~ Nicola G. Karesh, Copyright © 2009 – All rights reserved.

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Song Of Silence

My soul is longing to sing
And dance
With carefree,
Wild
Abandon.
Longing to pour its heart out
With a melody
Soft and true.
Longing to soar
And claim
Unknown heights.
Dizzy.
Breathlessly awaiting
An unseen partner
To rise up
And share the music
Playing silently
In my heart

Nicola G. Karesh, Copyright © 2009 – All rights reserved.

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This morning, I was drawn to an entry that I wrote last year, called “Devotion.” I was drawn to the feeling that my conversation with God is always a heartfelt experience of peace. That feels like the sweetest of promises to me and in this moment, it is such a welcome treasure. When I choose God’s will for me in any moment, I instantly open to an answer that is peace and an everlasting love that stretches beyond the bounds of my imagination.

Love and our capacity to choose however we experience, is at the forefront of my mind today. The fact that our existence on this earth is temporary and we never know when our time here is up, offers me perspective on how I can be. Using my precious days wisely as if they were my last ones. Sinking deeply into each gifted moment and really relishing the treasure of my life. Cherishing each divine soul that I encounter on my spiritual path, seeing myself mirrored back in countless ways. Blessing and acknowledging the power of this reflected gaze. Feeling the sweet and sometimes fierce grace that the Creator offers and knowing that every aspect is here to serve and bring me closer to home. Every second of "now" serves me with an unspoken gift to bring me home.

An excerpt from Adyashanti's book "The End of Your World: uncensored straight talk on the nature of enlightenement," comes to mind. It is beautiful, direct and simple in its message:

"It is very important to know that life itself is often our greatest teacher. Life is full of grace - sometimes it's wonderful grace, beautiful grace, moments of bliss and happiness and joy, and sometimes it's fierce grace, like illness, losing a job, losing someone we love, or a divorce. Some people make the greatest leaps in their consciousness when addiction has them on their knees, for example, and they find themselves reaching out for a different way of being. Life itself has a tremendous capacity to show us truth, to wake us up. And yet, many of us avoid this thing called life, even as it is attempting to wake us up.

The divine itself is life in motion. The divine is using the situations of our lives to accomplish its own awakening, and many times it takes the difficult situations to wake us up.

The irony is that most human beings spend their lives avoiding painful situations. Not that we are successful, but we are always trying to avoid pain. We have an unconscious belief that our greatest growth in consciousness and awareness comes through beautiful moments. We may, indeed, make great leaps in consciousness through beautiful moments, but I'd say that most people make their greatest leaps in consciousness in the difficult times.

This is something a lot of people don't want to acknowledge - that our greatest difficulties, suffering, and pain are a form of fierce grace. They are potent and important components of our awakening, if we're ready for them. If we're ready to turn and face them, we can see and receive the gifts that they have to offer - even if the gifts sometimes feel like they are being forced upon us. Whether the circumstance is illness, the death of a loved one, divorce, addiction, problems at work - it's important to face our life situations in order to see the inherent gifts that are available."

This week, our family received an unexpected curve ball from the Universe. No dodging or way to outrun what is before us. For me, there really is only one obvious choice these days, when life stands before you. Meet its gaze. Dive right in and experience fully what life has presented. Struggling and resistance prolong the inevitability of what is to be. No matter how things may seem, somewhere buried inside, there is value. Even the fierce grace is to be allowed and appreciated. In the lesson before us, there is the distant and beckoning glimmer of truth, freedom, sincerity and the courage to be real.

 

Self Inquiry and Another Personal Lesson

The other day, my next door neighbour called and I noticed that since her call, I have had a little bit of charge whenever I bring the incident to mind. When I first spoke to her, my initial thought, was that she was inviting me to some political event in our area, collecting money for a fundraiser or alerting me about our roaming bear! No such luck!

She wanted to know how long our trailer was going to be parked outside her house. Uh oh! I had the immediate sense that we should have warned her. We had someone clearing away a few leaning trees and they had parked the trailer for their track hoe on the grassy shoulder by the road. I later discovered that he himself had told her that he would be there for a few days and she had said okay. Never mind that though, as I certainly wasn’t aware of this when we spoke on the phone.

I felt myself go a little bit into confusion on the phone, wondering aloud where on earth the man was going to park the trailer. We have no frontage space on the road and we share the access to our long driveway through the woods with the neighbour. I excel at many things, yet common sense and practical matters have not always been my forte! There is a little voice in my head right now commenting, that that is just a story that I tell myself! As I was sorting things out and considering what to do, she abruptly concluded that if it wasn’t moved by tomorrow night, she would call the police!

I believe that in that moment, I was shocked. No other word for it. It’s a similar feeling I get (only definitely magnified in this case), when I ask something that I see as reasonable and my child looks at me and says flat out “No.” Similar feeling of being taken aback with this response. What do you mean “No?” What do you mean call the police? Call the police? No? From my perspective and obvious judgment in that moment, something about that seems odd, out of place and definitely out of whack! I clearly have some mistaken belief that reason will be met with reason. There is also something underlying about liking order in my world.

I think that I was silent and stunned for a few minutes before I reacted and told her that she could go ahead and do that then! I know that in that very moment, I reverted to a moody teenager full of spice and fire. I adopted a kind of “don’t mess with me” attitude! The cantackerous caged dog was let loose and was now ready to bite! All very old and familiar. Naturally from that wondrous space, I called up the police to check the legalities of the matter. The dispatcher was helpful and obviously all about keeping the peace. The government owned a portion of that grassy area and I was clear in saying that I hadn’t a clue whether or not we were on the neighbour’s property or not. If they were called, the police would come out and talk to us both and if we were on her land, they would ask the owner to remove the offending item.

I later discovered that 30 feet (or yards?) from the center line belongs to the government. The tree cutting man was certain that he was on government property but was himself amazed as he had warned her that he was going to park there when he had seen her at the mail box. Well, I guess he can do his own processing if he has any!

All kinds of things came to mind. Smart answers and childish deeds that I could do to probably have my say and the last word! Jeez, isn’t reactivity and the ego something!

For the whole day, I kept feeling amazed and stunned by her unexpected response. I called her back and told her that I was shocked because we had never ever had one single negative interaction. It felt like something that came out of left field. I didn’t see it coming and was really unprepared with how to deal with it. For the most part, I am surrounded by people who seem to behave in a “decent” and “responsible” manner and life moves smoothly. Even when these “decent” people throw me, what amounts to a curve ball, they are open to change or do seem to care about another’s feelings.

So what do we really have here for me, because it always comes back to the individual. What’s first coming up for me, is a lesson about acceptance. Allowing everything to be as it is. There is obviously judgment on my part about how she “should” behave and what constitutes “proper” behaviour. Acceptance means that she gets to be however she chooses to be and I let go of needing to change her. Looking closer at how I derailed myself from being in a nice clear space...

I love what Adyashanti says in “The End of Your World: uncensored straight talk on the nature of enlightenment.” He offers that “When a person’s awakening vacillates, he or she often asks me, “How do I stay in the awakened state?” That is asking the wrong question. In spirituality, it is important that we ask the right questions. To wonder how to stay in the awakened state is a totally reasonable thing to do, but the question itself is arising from the dream state. Spirit never asks itself, “How do I stay within myself?” That would be ridiculous. It just makes no sense, coming from the true nature of things. What makes more sense is to ask how you unenlighten yourself.”

Adya further remarks, that “We are in relationship with situations and people, interacting with lovers and friends and children and all the rest. It is this gritty fabric of life where the spiritual rubber hits the road. What is required is the willingness to let life impact you; to let yourself see when life impacts you; to see if you go into any sort of separation about it, if you go into judgment, if you go into blame, if you go into “should” or “shouldn’t,” if you start to point the finger somewhere other than at yourself.... It’s coming to grips with the fact that the only person who can cause us to suffer, who can cause us to misperceive illusion and separation, who has this much power, is us.”

So how am I unenlightening myself and putting myself back into illusion with this situation?

Lots of “should’s on my part.” I have the perspective that something and someone is wrong and they should behave better. I didn’t do anything to warrant being threatened by the police and I should be treated better than this.

There is a symbolic line drawn in the sand with the “crazy” neighbour on one side and “innocent” me on the other. Separation and a big gap. Quite funny actually when I consider my history of behaviour that is far from reasonable, calm and innocent!

Everywhere I go with this, it seems to come back to acceptance and non-judgment. To simply be with the experience without adding anything to it. Allowing people to be as they are. Allowing life to impact me, feeling what arises and just being present with it. Right now, it’s all like a gentle wave that washes over me... back and forth, back and forth. Gradually, there is just the slightest of movement as things settle down. Back and forth and I feel peace, dawning recognition of myself in this other person. Easing into the flow of life... rough edges being softened and there is just a neutral feeling that remains.

Self Inquiry and a Personal Lesson

Last night, I had quite a life lesson that came out of a short interaction with my 9 year old daughter. She was sharing a project that she had completed and the rest of our family was listening attentively. She was describing all of the objects that Abel, the mouse in her story, had packed in his sack. The list got really long and the items seemed to get bigger and bigger. I was amazed that the sack could hold a blanket and that the mouse would be able to carry it and then I burst out laughing when she added that Abel also had a tiger skin in the sack! So, something about the image of this mouse realistically, or not, carrying all of this loot around amused me no end! Yes, I laughed and loudly at that! I am not one that holds mirth in very well! I almost had to leave the room at one of our home-school choir programmes, for fear of erupting into uncontrollable giggling at something my dear daughter was probably not supposed to be doing! But, that’s another story!


Back to this one. So, out of left field, it felt to me anyway, my daughter heatedly criticised (felt more like lamblasted) my laughing at her. She later burst out crying and apologised for doing this and we were able to work through it together. The point is not really about this aspect, but about what it brought up within me as I went from feeling really centered and happy to all of a sudden feeling separate and unhappy... The self-inquiry relates to how I get disconnected from Source.


In Adyashanti’s book, “The End Of Your World: uncensored straight talk on the nature of enlightenment,” he writes about being willing to be honest with ourselves. To look and ask, “What in me can still go into division? What in me can still go into hate, into ignorance, into greed? What in me can cause me to feel divided, isolated, full of sorrow? Where are those spots in me that are less than awakened?”


Last night, I experienced many of those “spots.” I felt like someone had burst my bubble of happiness. I was laughing spontaneously at something that felt amusing and I was startled by my child's angry outburst. It felt like an attack, because it “hit” me unexpectedly.


I felt hurt that she was seemingly making me wrong and bad. It felt like I was being reprimanded for being happy and joyful. There was a momentary confusion of sorts with the shock of her response and a feeling of needing to withdraw and protect myself.


Looking back, it seemed from my body language, that there was some shame as I felt myself wanting to retreat, protect and disengage emotionally.


There must be some unconscious or hidden desire to “pay her back,” because I stopped any eye contact, ceased to “follow” her story or give any feedback. I had withdrawn my emotional support which is one way in the past I shut myself away from others. There’s got to be a belief in there about "If you hurt me, I’ll get you back."


Buried in it all, there is a profound feeling of sadness to feel thrown abruptly out of joy. Somewhere in there too is a limiting belief about outside factors affecting my moods. Also the feeling of “Why would someone do this to me?” A sadness when people don’t behave “nicely” to each other.


I can feel the whole thing again, like it’s taking place right now. I am sitting there, heart wide open, defenceless, innocent and someone throws a spear into my heart. The beliefs, thoughts and feelings flow shifting from disbelief to anger... I cannot believe that my loved one would hurt me. I feel betrayed. You’re not supposed to do this. This isn’t fair! This is not how you play. I can’t believe you did this to me. You did this. You spoiled everything. How could you?


The beliefs now shifting from anger to a desire to hurt back and seek revenge.
If that’s the way you’re going to play, I’ll show you! You don’t know who you’re messing with!

Wow! This one goes all the way back (and probably further still) to a distinct and familiar memory of when I was in school. I was about 10 or 11 and I had a picture that I had drawn with a heart on it. Inside the brightly coloured heart, the bold words, “I love me.” I was feeling completely delighted, innocent and happy with my new discovery. This was followed by an unexpected and startling reaction from my teacher who felt that I was incredibly selfish. I know that I got my palm or leg slapped with the wooden ruler. I don’t recall if there was any other punishment. There again, I was left with the feeling of betrayal. Seemingly attacked by someone who stood in a position of authority and whom I viewed as being one to cherish and protect children.


The lesson for me becomes how to remain open-hearted and connected to Source when things like this come up? How to feel compassion for us both? How to continue to love with all of my heart, remembering that we are all much more than our personalities.


What’s the truth of all of this for me? We are human and Divine in nature. When I see others as only human, I miss the bigger picture. I limit what I see before me and I limit the eyes from which I see. When I feel my connection to Source, there is the immediate knowing that I have enough love and compassion in me to maintain my connection with others no matter what. I also remember that no matter how it looks on the surface, nobody is less than Divine. The stream of love flows steady and without interruption.

WINDOWS TO HEAVEN

A portal of light.
Opportunities,
Like windows to the heavens.

Father,
Your pearly opening,
Draws my intent gaze.

All that I am
Sinks into your quiet light.

Gentle movements across the sky.
Fluttering of leaves
And my heart beating
With a soft, rhythmic pulse.

Windows to my heart.
A flicker of light,
And I rest in heaven.


~ Nicola G. Karesh, Copyright © 2009 – All rights reserved.